Archive for the 'The Music' Category

The Way It Shouldn’t Be

Published
by
dtclarinet
on March 14, 2007
in Behind the Scenes and The Music
. 6 Comments

We played a family oriented program this afternoon. It involved a quick rehearsal followed by an hour long pops concert. The conductor for this event is a long standing regular with us. He has established himself as our main pops conductor, with good reason. His amiable, energetic and lighthearted demeanor appeals to our pops audiences.

To give you perspective, our pops concerts usually feature a big name artist who plays with the orchestra on the second half. The first half features just the orchestra. Most of the audience comes to hear the big name act, not necessarily the orchestra. So, despite our being “featured” on the first half, most of the audience is patiently waiting for the big act. This conductor bridges that gap well. He has high energy and is comfortable chatting and joking with them between pieces.

He also has talent as a musician. He knows good phrasing, good sound and pitch when he hears it. He corrects valid problems during rehearsals. But he has a disconcerting tension in his body when he conducts. There’s an urgency about him, despite his affable exterior. His face is often contorted and impatient during performances, and his arms move in tight, insistent motions. All this contributes to a tense orchestra. Our demeanor reflects his.

The most frustrating expression of this tension and urgency are his tempos. He tends to take them too fast. Even after setting a tempo, he seems to want to “keep us on our toes” by constantly pushing the tempo forward. It’s as if it’s never fast enough. So we never settle into a rhythm, a beat. As a player, I feel like I’m being dragged on a short leash through a beautiful park, missing all the glorious scenery I am paid to notice and recreate. Perhaps he sees it as a way to keep the audience from being bored, but is that doing justice to the music or the audience?

Many musicians in my orchestra are as frustrated as I am. We don’t presume to know the best tempo for any piece. There are many valid possibilities for tempos for any particular music. That’s not the issue here. It’s whether the music is playable, and also about allowing a tempo to settle.

So, preparing for this short family concert we rehearsed a well known piece. It was very familiar, in fact. Which means we’ve also played it under some top notch conductors over the years. We know what the tempos should be. After we rehearsed is for a half hour or so, with tempos the upper edge of speed, he implored us to perform the music well despite such little rehearsal. (remember we know this music)

Then, during the concert, he pushed the tempos even more. When I tried to stabilize one accelerando to keep it sensible, he just ignored me and pushed ahead to an unplayable speed. It’s a shame he doesn’t have enough respect for us to give us the benefit of the doubt. He always says how much he loves us, but I don’t feel respect from the podium under him. I give my best, and he pushes it more.

I don’t know any conductor who would ignore the collective experience of 55 well trained, very experienced musicians. Does he remember that we have notes to play while he’s zipping away up there? Even if we get the notes at those tempos, they sound frantic with tension. I am happy to give my best, but when it’s never fast enough, I tend to give up and ignore him. I don’t think he would want that. The fact is, many big orchestras ignore their conductors to survive. The Columbus Symphony is unusual in that we really give our best and try to follow any conductor who leads us.

But we do so at a risk. The players are the ones blamed if the musical product is lacking, rarely the conductor. Who will be our advocate in this case if not we? No one. Again, I don’t question this person’s ability or validity as a musician. As I’ve said, he bridges a difficult gap with out pops audiences. But he insists on pushing us to play tempos beyond either tradition or reason. That affects our musical product.

Making music shouldn’t be a tug of war. A conductor can give urgency to a tempo without ignoring the musicians and without looking frantic. A balance of responsibility between conductor and musicians is crucial. It’s a group effort. Each knows what they’re doing. True, each may prefer differing tempos for good reasons. The musicians want playable tempos so the music sounds clear, the conductor wants to create excitement. The two meet in the middle. That’s the way music is made.

Music Making versus Playing

Published
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dtclarinet
on November 13, 2006
in Mastery, Technique and The Music
. 2 Comments

Sometimes your heart is into it, and other times, well, you just go through the motions. We had a tough week for the orchestra last week. Our ex music director was engaged for a guest appearance. A few years ago the orchestra and board were deeply divided over whether to keep him on as music director. Ultimately, one faction won and he was “allowed to move on” in his career.

So when he came back last week, only a week after our new music director whom we LOVE, conducted us, it was an uphill struggle to keep our spirits up. The program consisted of the Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto and Brahms 3rd Symphony. Brahms 3rd is one of my favorites, not only because it has a gorgeous clarinet solo in the second movement, but it’s also a masterpiece of symphonic composing. So, our ex director, who always explores the limits of every phrase, is leading us through this incredible piece, and half of us are suffering through it while the other half are trying to get into it.

To credit the orchestra, everyone did their best to do make music. This guy, despite his passion, is known for his unpredictable interpretations. And that’s putting it lightly. To him, all music is Italian opera, full of drama. He can swoop down on phrase from the middle of nowhere and wallow in it like a girl in a bubble bath. Meanwhile, we’re turning blue or purple, his least favorite color, waiting for the next beat. And sometimes the next beat is really a beast, which swallows the bubble bath whole, girl and all, moving ahead to the prowl on the next unsuspecting phrase.

Now don’t get me wrong or anything…I like him. He’s a great cook and in love with life, something most Americans know little about. We are a culture of bean counters, note takers, fact checkers, time keepers, rule makers, and on. Making music is not about those things. It’s about being free of the structures which convey its language. It’s about letting time float. Occasionally, he creates a brilliant nuance I could never imagine, which shudders through me like a homogenization beam from another planet, and I realize what music is all about.

Each musician eventually finds a personal balance between subjective and objective interpretations of music. Subjective interpreters seeks the meaning through the emotions, the feeling of the music, while objective ones strive to recreate the composer’s intentions. Both are valid. In my opinion, George Szell maintained the perfect balance between the two.

I lean toward the subjective camp. There are times when I feel I’m only playing the music, not feeling it, not really making music of it. Freshness helps wake me from the blindness of familiarity, especially with pieces I’ve played many times. This week’s Brahms 3rd gave me a chance to see it new, as through a microscope.

Over the years of being under this guy as music director, he has shown me the wonderful nuances and magic which can be pulled from an ordinary phrase of music. Really there are infinite ways to play any piece. The objective camp believes there is one ideal way. I think there are numerous ideal ways. And often you don’t know what might work until you try it. Inspiration is critical to making music.

After the show I argued with some colleagues, many of them string players, about these issues. I have to concede, this guy stretched Brahms way beyond the traditional, North German, stoic interpretation which works best with his music: the latent passion struggling to be free of its shadows, the yearning Bohemian dreaming of a better world.

Yet, from my little island of music making within the group, I relished wallowing in the secret depths of Brahms’ introverted complexities, in the rich density of his tonal language, the Escheresque rhythmic structures. And many of my colleagues in the winds and brass felt similarly. We were “gellin”!

The strings, however, saw it completely differently. They are the sea sprawled around our little windy islands. Spread apart and in much greater numbers, they couldn’t rely on the intimate person to person connections to stay together like the winds and brass did. They were lost at sea, while the guy up front was busy getting signals from outer space. They were not happy. Nope. Not!

This brings me back to making music versus playing. The two are codependent. This week, while some of us were able to make beautiful music within the relative chaos coming from the podium, to flourish within it’s spontaneous freedom and compulsive freshness, others struggled just to play the notes together. Ultimately, if we can’t all enjoy the same spontaneity and freedom while playing together, it lacks the most important feature of a great performance: cohesiveness.

So, here’s to guzzling music raw when ever we can, whether it’s 60 or 100 proof. But the lasting impression comes in the richness of a balanced meal accompanied by an aged wine, when we can actually remember what we did the night before.

The Spirit of Mozart

Published
by
dtclarinet
on October 29, 2006
in The Music
. 3 Comments

Today I performed at a church where the music minister regularly hires a full orchestra to feature the mystical and healing power of music in the service. The entire service featured the music of Mozart, a glorious collection of Wolfie’s best and most sublime, including the Andante from the flute concerto K315, Kyrie from the Coronation Mass K317, two movements from Vesperae solennes di confessore K339, and the famous Adagio from the Clarinet Concerto K622.

Written near the end of his life, Mozart achieved a perfect balance between profound meaning and simple expression in his clarinet concerto. The adagio begins with a simple, arching melody which rises higher with each two bar statement. A second arching line overlaps between solo and orchestra, with tension and resolution soaring over a satisfying peak. Then the “B” section changes moods, allowing the solo clarinet a free and wandering fantasy, a conversation with itself, which builds slowly to a fervent musical climax. Here the orchestra drops out and the clarinet is left alone to float down from the rich tension, back to the simple “A” part from the beginning. The movement ends with a long coda of new, rambling material, which settles, like a feather, gently down to a relaxed repose.

Before I played, this poem The Song and Prayer of Birds by Thomas H. Troeger (b 1945) was read by the minister:

The song and prayer of birds
is melody alone,
Their hymns employ no words.
Their praise is purely tone.
Their song is prayer enough.
Love hears what sound conveys,
and love does not rebuff
a creature’s wordless praise.
And so we trust that prayer
does not depend on words
to reach the source of care
who understands the birds.

After hearing this poem, I was inspired to play the pure meaning of the music, without thinking or second-guessing or analyzing. I just felt the phrases as they came and went, abstract shaped of sound and song. I was able to sing through my instrument as if it wasn’t there.

Entertaining the Conductor

Published
by
dtclarinet
on October 25, 2006
in Behind the Scenes, Off the Record, Programing and The Music
. 4 Comments

The other night we had a pops concert, a tribute to Arthur Fiedler. The program style reflected his unique balance of light music with one substantial classical piece. We played about a half hour of “medium” light classical, some Wagner overtures and a Puccini Arias arrangement for orchestra. After an intermission, we played the entire Tchaikovsky violin concert, a hefty chunk of music for a pops audience. Then came another intermission. Yes, two intermissions. At the Boston Pops, much of the audience is set up at tables, so they can eat and drink during the concert. Then two intermissions make sense. Anyway, onward.

The third half was all schlock. “Fiddle Faddle”, a tough little bugger, especially at the caffeinated tempos our conductor likes. Then a piece for typewriter and orchestra, very cute. Our principal percussionist dressed as a sleazy secretary, with a blue beehive wig and a cigarette hanging out of his/her mouth. The typewriter was the real thing, a heavy, old battle ax. The part was mostly the ticking of the keys, inter-spaced with the ripping of the carriage and the infamous little bell to warn you to return the carriage. Fun.

Anyway, one of the traditions of Fiedler was to spontaneously insert an encore in the middle of the third half. Our conductor warned us. On Saturday night he decided to do it. The piece was “Stars and Stripes”. My music had gotten shuffled into the mix of everything in my folder, and I couldn’t find it. He started the piece, as I frantically looked for the part. Bum, bum-t-um tum, tum-tum-tum-tum-tum-TUM! The music started. I’ve played it many, many times, but in different keys, and with different repeats, etc. It’s not an easy piece, and I don’t have it memorized. So I kept looking. It wasn’t there. I thought someone had played a joke on me, but our orchestra doesn’t play jokes, they just get even. I started at the beginning of the folder and turned each piece over. I’m right in the middle of the orchestra, dead center, in sight of all. There I am calmly (now I know all are looking at me, so calm is the key) paging through my music…The piece is not that long, so it’s about a third over…and finally, there it is, hiding between Fiddle Faddle and Buglers Holiday. I knew it, it was a conspiracy between the string and the brass! Anyway, I dove in and played the rest.

After the concert, as I walked out of the hall, the conductor happened to see me, and laughed as he said, “Dave, I had so much fun watching you frantically looking for your music during the march. Thanks for breaking the monotony and making me laugh!”

I smiled. At least someone enjoyed it.

Playing What Is

Published
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dtclarinet
on October 23, 2006
in Mastery, Technique and The Music
. 0 Comments

A musician sits practicing alone in his room, as he has done most of his life. He is a beloved performer, respected and revered by many. He is concentrated and fearless in his focus. Time passes effortlessly here. Time stops.

The light in his room dims. He looks up from the piece he is playing, the solo part from the slow movement of Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto. Above his music stand, there hovers a soft violet glow. He hears a chorus murmuring.

(voices of listeners from all time):You play the music in our hearts. You play things we feel. You are deep and wise.

(performer): No, I play what I am told to play. I play what I know you will feel. But I do not feel what you do. I am not wise.

This saddens us. You are not what you seem. Tell us why.

I think and feel as you do, but I am empty. I fill myself with things which give the impression I am full. I show you yourself.

But how can you show us so much knowing so little?

I feel my pain with doubt. I question everything. I challenge reality. But the structure of the music gives me strength. It quells my doubt.

But you do not feel what we feel, if you doubt your pain and question everything.

I feel what you feel in my own way. When I lay my head on the breast of my mother and weep from joy and gratitude at the gift of life she gave me, I feel what you feel when I play the music. But I do not feel the music as you do.

What do you feel when you play?

I see patterns of structure, puzzles laid out by the composer, shapes and form, lines and colors. I see how I must fit into that puzzle. I have many choices, but only a few good ones. I struggle to play effortlessly. I am a machine, a thinking machine, adjusting constantly to fit into the puzzle and become nothing but the composers dream.

But what do you feel?

I do not feel. I calculate, I listen, I sense. But I am not there to feel. If I feel, then I am lost.

Then why do we feel what you do not?

You feel what I do not because I do not allow myself to feel it. I give up my feeling so you may have it.

(the voices recede. the violet light fades above his stand. he is alone. he continues his practice, shaping the perfect phrases of Mozart’s perfect music. he is content.)

Inspired by the poem-
The Man with the Blue Guitar
by Wallace Stevens

The Spirit of Performing

Published
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dtclarinet
on October 21, 2006
in Mastery, Technique and The Music
. 0 Comments

When performing music, I have to balance a “subjective” interpretation from an “objective” one. This means I need to pay attention to the notes on the page and composer’s markings as much as my own interpretation of them. But both parts of the interpretation are important to good music making. The spirit of the music must be recreated, not just the notes and markings.

This week I had some trouble with my reeds warping. Those little pieces of cane don’t like the dry weather of approaching winter. So it feels like I’m going to squawk all the time. Not a pleasant feeling when you need to be relaxed to phrase beautifully. A squeak on a clarinet is not a pretty thing. EVERYONE hears it. I used to have a giggling fit when ever someone squeaked. Now, as a pro, I look innocent, hoping everyone thinks it’s my stand partner who did it. UGH!

Preparing for a Concerto

Published
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dtclarinet
on October 4, 2006
in Clarinet, Mastery and The Music
. 0 Comments

As an orchestral clarinetist, I don’t play concertos very often. I do it more often than others in my orchestra, but it’s by choice. There is no obligation to do so. My job is as a principal orchestral player, which has its own set of challenges specific to the job. I could be content to play from within the orchestra, but I like to be out front once in awhile.

On the other hand, there are many clarinetists who solo exclusively, such as Richard Stoltzman. Once, while having a drink with him after he played a concerto with us a few years back, he said something like this to me, “I wish I had the skill to play in an orchestra like you. I became a soloist because I didn’t get a symphony gig”. Mind you, this was meant as a light and supportive comment to me. He is made to be a soloist, and I am quite sure he is every bit as much or more skilled as I to play in an orchestra. The point is, it’s a specialization, like being a medical researcher versus being a doctor. Both are skilled in medicine, but one is more public.

Playing a concerto is a very different experience from playing in the orchestra. Not better or worse, just different. The feeling is more exhilarating, but also more stressful. The playing position is usually standing, not sitting, which changes the way the instrument feels as I play. Even the approach to sound is different, more open and “soloistic”. By contrast, as a principal clarinetist, where I also get to “solo” from within the orchestra, the feeling is usually more reserved so as to blend better. Think of two paintings, one of a really cool looking cat, the other has a cool cat somewhere in the painting with people and furniture and books around it. I’m still the cool cat in each, but less prominent in one.

The pressure of concerto-ing is higher, much higher. After all you are standing out there right in front with everyone staring at you, rather than sitting, somewhat hidden about halfway back in the orchestra. Preparing a concerto is also far more time consuming than orchestral music. In my case, this is partly because I am much more familiar with orchestral music than concertos, since it’s my regular job. So the preparation is intense and long. It usually starts many months in advance. I pick apart the piece and focus on the really difficult passages, breaking them into manageable mini-projects which I slowly build back together.

To hone my musical ideas, I listen to several recordings of reputable soloists, taking style from those players and forming my own interpretation from them. While learning the piece, I allow my imagination to run free with the interpretation, taking far more liberty in my phrasing that I would in the final performance. This is to encourage my muse to be creative. I find this is necessary to help break free of the habitual constraints of playing orchestral repertoire. In that case, I am interpreting only a small part under the larger interpretation of a conductor’s.
Sometimes I hire a pianist to rehearse with, to get a feel for interacting with the accompaniment.

Yet, as a concerto soloist, one has more liberty to create a style which matches one’s ability. Many factors are the choice of the soloist. Obviously the selection of a particular concerto is one. Otherwise there is the choice of tempos, the amount of rhythmic freedom, the amount of dynamic contrast, etc. Naturally, a soloist should emphasize his or her best features. If he is a more expressive player, the tempo can be set accordingly. If pyrotechnics is her specialty, then the style is set accordingly. Here again, as an orchestral player, I need to adjust my attitude toward having more control over the interpretation. But the resulting freedom can be very gratifying.

As the final days before the first rehearsal approach, I meditate on the music I will play. I hear it in my head, sometimes to the point of madness. Little snippets will run in a playback loop, over and over and over. But, thinking about the piece, getting one’s mind around it, is as important as actual practice. When I play, I will go over the most tricky spots, playing slowly, cultivating a calm physical and mental attitude. I often say to myself, like a mantra, “You know this piece, you can play it, your fingers can play it. Trust yourself”. It’s so easy to become frantic as the day approaches.

I had one stressful incident in my preparation for a concerto recently. I had stayed up quite late working on reeds. (another post altogether) I placed the reeds on my practice table, cleaned the cat litter box, put out the trash for morning pickup, and went to bed. I acknowledged that I should have started working on those reeds a few days earlier to have them stabilize by the performance. (reeds, made plant cane, need several days to adjust to being wet and played) The next morning, the reeds were missing, gone. I looked all over the house, near the cat box, in the bathroom, in the trash, outside. I don’t have a dog, so I only had myself to blame.:) In my fatigue, I must have inadvertently thrown them out with the cat litter and trash, which was then picked up the next morning.

Now I was really behind. I had to spend several more hours that day getting enough reeds going to give me a decent choice before the performance. A delicately timed schedule is easily upset.

Getting the right reed is crucial. Ideally, I can get on stage just before the first rehearsal to test my reeds and pick the one which flourishes in the hall. Our hall needs a full, resonant sound. It’s difficult to pick a reed for that in my small living room where I practice.

After the first rehearsal of the piece, I can usually begin to enjoy the whole event. I say begin to enjoy. It’s not over yet. However, many of the unknowns are now known. I know how the piece feels live, I know how my reeds are doing, or not doing, I know how the conductor will follow me, I know how I’ll interpret the piece. I also know there’s not a whole lot more preparation I can do. Back to the little mantra above, “Trust Yourself.”

Now, my focus is to stay primed and calm, ready and poised. I care for my body and smile a lot at my Muse, for that’s who will transform me from a person playing a concerto into a musician playing music. It’s a world of difference.

Fiber and Play

Published
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dtclarinet
on July 24, 2006
in Clarinet, Mastery and The Music
. 0 Comments

As physical players of our instruments, we need a practice of cleansing the fibers of our muscles as we play. So play becomes the fiber to cleanse and relax the “fibers” of our muscles.

Chamber music, read at relaxed parties, with lots of yummy hors-d’oeuvre and good wine, becomes a necessary part of staying fresh in our playing.

We need play, in the sophisticated setting of Mozart’s brilliance, to ripen our musical souls as expressed through our bodies, and for those corporeal souls to flourish.

Great chamber music offers an individuality rarely present in the orchestra, except in solo parts. But even in orchestral solo parts, the player is subject to so many exterior demands, such as the thoughts of the conductor and acoustics, not to mention the sheer number of other “opinions” extant. So chamber music is “soloing” at home with good friends. Could there be any better way of learning trust and physical poise in an intimate setting?

So, back to fiber. We all need it. Fiber for the body, the soul and the mind.